Post navigation

Recent magazine assignment in print

I just received two copies of Bulletin magazine, in which a story I did is published. The issue in whole offers a general view to the lives of middle class people from around the world. I did my part for Indonesia.

For the story, I photographed middle class people in Yogyakarta, Surabaya, and Jakarta, and also some general views of each cities. The story tries to give faces to the numbers. Indonesia is diverse, so how diverse? Indonesia economy is currently on the rise, so who are the people enjoying that rise? What is and who are Indonesian middle class? How they became middle class; what are their life stories? Who are they?

During the assignment, me and the writer met a different set of people who we think fit into the general description of middle class. With each person, the writer did an interview and I tried to make their portraits. So basically I was listening to the interviews first before making the portraits. And their stories are really inspiring.

The assignment was rather a quick one. From the time I was contacted by the editor from Switzerland, I was already photographing within a week. I then travelled from Yogyakarta to Surabaya and Jakarta with the writer, spending only two days in each cities. And soon after stepping the soil of home back in Yogyakarta, the editor already asked me to send her a selection of photographs I had taken.

I did it in December 2012, so it kind of made sense that the editor kept rushing me, so the work could be done before Christmas and New Year, even though they would only publish it in February 2013. And honestly I am very happy to finally see my photographs in print now. I like the layout (clean and simple) and the print quality (the colours don’t shift and are correctly printed). Thank you editor, for being so nice, sending me the issue half the world away from Switzerland to Indonesia! ∎